it been Grub-street, I would have let people think as they please; and I think that's right: is not it now? so flap your hand, and make wry mouths yourself, saucy doxy. Now comes DD. Why sirrahs, I did write in a fortnight my 47th; and if it did not come in due time, can I help wind and weather? am I a Laplander? am I a witch? can I work miracles? can I make easterly winds? Now I am against Dr Smith. I drink little water with my wine, yet I believe he is right. Yet Dr Cockburn told me a little wine would not hurt me; but it is so hot and dry, and water is so dangerous. The worst thing here is my evenings at Lord Masham's, where lordtreasurer comes, and we sit till after twelve. But it is convenient I should be among them for a while as much as possible. I need not tell you why. But I hope that will be at an end in a month or two, one way or other, and I am resolved it shall; but I can't go to Tunbridge, or any where else out of the way, in this juncture. So Ppt designs for Templeoag (what a name is that!) Whereabouts is that place? I hope not very far from Higgins is here, roaring that all is wrong in Ireland, and would have me get him an audience of lordtreasurer to tell him so; but I will have nothing to do in it, no not I, faith. We have had no thunder till last night, and till then we were dead for want of rain; but there fell a great deal : no field looked green. I reckon the queen will go to Windsor in three or four weeks: and if the secretary takes a house there, I shall be sometimes with him. But how affectedly Ppt talks of my being here all the summer; which I do not intend nor to stay one minute longer in England than becomes the circumstances I am in. I wish you would go soon into the country, and take a good deal of it; and where better than Trim? Joe will be your humble servant, Parvisol your slave, and Raymond at your command, for he piques himself on good manners. I have seen Dilly's wife-and I have seen once or twice old Bradley here. He is very well, very old, and very wise I believe I must go see his wife, when I have leisure. I should be glad to see goody Stoyte and her husband; pray give them my humble service, and to Catherine, and to Mrs Walls.I cannot be the least bit in love with Mrs Walls.I suppose the cares of the husband increase with the fruitfulness of the wife. I am glad at heart to hear of Ppt's good health: please to let her finish it by drinking waters. I hope DD had her bill, and has her money. Remember to write a due time before the money is wanted, and be good girls, good dallars, I mean, and no crying dallars. I heard somebody coming up stairs, and forgot I was in the country; and I was afraid of a visitor; that is one advantage of being here, that I am not teased with solicitors. Molt the chemist is my acquaintance. My service to Dr Smith. I sent the question to him about Sir Walter Raleigh's cordial, and the answer he returned is in these words: "It is directly after Mr Boyle's receipt." That commission is performed; if he wants any of it, Molt shall use him fairly. I suppose Smith is one of your physicians. So, now your letter is fully and impartially answered; not as rascals answer me: I believe if I writ an essay upon a straw, I should have a shoal of answerers but no matter for that; you see I can answer without making any reflections, as becomes men of learning. Well but now for the peace: why we expect it daily; but the French have the stuff in their own hands, and we trust to their honesty. I wish it were otherwise. Things are now in the way of being soon in the extremes of well or ill.— I hope and believe the first. Lord Wharton is gone out of town in a rage, and curses himself and friends for ruining themselves in defending Lord Marlborough and Godolphin, and taking Nottingham into their favour. He swears, he will meddle no more during this reign; a pretty speech at sixtysix, and the queen is near twenty years younger, and now in very good health; for you must know her health is fixed by a certain reason, that she has done with braces (I must use the expression) and nothing ill is happened to her since; so she has a new lease of her life. Read The Letter to a Whig Lord. Do you ever read? Why don't you say so? I mean, does DD read to Ppt? Do you walk? I think Ppt should walk to DD, as DD reads to Ppt, for Ppt you must know is a good walker; but not so good as Pdfr. I intend to dine to-day with Mr Lewis: but it threatens rain; and I shall be too late to get a lift; and I must write to the bishop of Clogher. It is now ten in the morning; and this is all writ at a heat. Farewell, dearest MD, FW, Me, &c. LETTER XLIX. Kensington, July 1, 1712. I NEVER was in a worse station for writing letters than this; for I go to town early; and when I come home at night, I generally go to Lord Masham's, where lord-treasurer comes, and we stay till past twelve, but I am now resolved to write journals again, though my shoulder is not yet well; for I have still a few itching pimples, and a little pain I now and then. It is now high cherry time with us; take notice, is it so soon with you? And we have early apricots; and gooseberries are ripe. On Sunday archdeacon Parnel* came here to see me. It seems he has been ill for grief of his wife's death, and has been two months at Bath. He has a mind to go to Dunkirk with Jack Hill, and I persuade him to it, and have spoke to Hill to receive him; but I doubt he won't have spirit to go. I have made Ford gazetteer, and got two hundred pounds a-year settled on the employment by the secretaries of state, beside the perquisites. It is the prettiest employment in England of its bigness; yet the puppy does not seem satisfied with it. Í think people keep some follies to themselves, till they have occasion to produce them. He thinks it not genteel enough, and makes twenty difficulties. It is impossible to make any man easy. His salary is paid him every week, if he pleases, without taxes or abatements. He has little to do for it. He has a pretty office, with coals, candles, papers, &c.; can frank what letters he will; and his perquisites, if he takes care, may be worth one hundred pounds more. I hear the bishop of Clogher is landing, or landed, in England; and I hope to see him in a few days. I was to see Mrs Bradley on Sunday night. Her youngest son is to marry somebody worth nothing, and her daughter was forced to leave Lady Giffard, because she was striking up an intrigue with a footman, who played well on the flute. This is the mother's account of it. Yesterday the * This amiable man, and elegant poet, was at this time archdeacon of Clogher, to which he was preferred by the bishop, so often mentioned in the course of this journal. + Charles Ford, Esq. a great friend of the dean. old bishop of Worcester, who pretends to be a prophet, went to the queen, by appointment, to prove to her majesty, out of Daniel and the Revelation, that four years hence there would be a war of religion; that the king of France would be a Protestant, and fight on their side; that the popedom would be destroyed, &c.; and declared, that he would be content to give up his bishopric if it were not true. Lord-treasurer, who told it me, was by, and some others; and I am told lord-treasurer confounded him sadly in his own learning, which made the old fool very quarrelsome. He is * * Dr William Lloyd, bishop of Worcester, was a man of great learning, and author of a "History of the Government of the Church," a 66 Chronological Account of the Life of Pythagoras," and many tracts against Popery. For Popery, indeed, he had an ancient and irreconcileable hatred and terror; having preached that funeral sermon upon the death of Sir Edmondbury Godfrey, two able-bodied divines attending as a guard to his person in the pulpit, lest before all the congregation he should be murdered by the Papists. His chronological studies led him to write a commentary on the Revelation, the result of which, and perhaps some confidence in the force of his own controversial tracts, led him, it seems, to hope for the conversion of the king of France from the errors of Rome. The bishop is thus described in a poem called" Faction Displayed:" "Then old Mysterio shook his silver hairs, That Anna to the Beast will be inclined. |